Breaking Half: "Ozymandias"

Bryan Cranston

Are you tired of long, tedious accounts of Breaking Bad episode recaps? Then look no further than Breaking Half: a weekly column that takes the good and bad from each week's episode of Breaking Bad and dilutes it down to the core necessities. Each Monday, Breaking Half will attempt to take a few key moments from the episode and boil it down to one juicy paragraph. 

Season 5, Episode 14

"Ozymandias"

*NOTE: While this poem is related to the name of tonight's episode, it doesn't appear. It is actually a promo that was released in the weeks leading up to the season debut.

"You're the smartest guy I ever met. And 

you're too stupid to see, he made up his 

mind ten minutes ago."

-Hank (Dean Norris)

In the conclusion to the shootout, Gomez (Steven Michael Quezada) and Hank (Dean Norris) are killed. Walter (Bryan Cranston) tries to get Jack (Michael Bowen) to reconsider by offering him the money buried beneath them. Jesse (Aaron Paul) is still alive and Walter decides that they could do what they want with him after revealing that he watched Jane die, leaving Todd (Jesse Plemons) to hang him from the ceiling of their meth lab to watch him cook. Hank's rebellion to temptation leaves him dead and Walter traumatized. Marie (Betsy Brandt) tries to convince Skyler (Anna Gunn) that Hank has arrested her husband. When Walt Jr. (R.J. Mitte) finds out, he is beyond mortified and cannot see why Skyler would go along with things. As Walter realizes that he is on the verge of being arrested, he tries to get the family together to disappear for awhile. When this fails and turns into a fight that leaves Walter's hand sliced open by a kitchen knife, he takes Holly and leaves. As Walt Jr. gets the police involved, Walter makes one last desperate gesture and gives Holly away to the firefighters. The episode ends with him hopping in a truck with his money and goods, alone, and heaving into the Witness Relocation Program.

Rating: 5 out of 5

R.J. Mitte

MVP: Walt Jr. (R.J. Mitte)

It has almost seemed beyond logical how Walt Jr. hasn't been aware that his family is so corrupt for as long as he has. Still, bookending the unfortunate, yet memorably heroic, death of Hank, Walt Jr. picks up the slack and becomes the man of the house in ways that his father has lost. From yelling at his mother for being an idiot to calling the police, it almost feels like Walt Jr. has justified his very existence in his time on screen tonight. He's passionate beyond belief and with his world crumbling, he is the crux to the episode's melancholic finale in which Walter's goal of raising money for his family essentially becomes a man divorced of nothing but the money. He doesn't even have an identity anymore. While it makes this episode stronger, part of me would have loved to see this side of Walt Jr. more throughout the final season. 

Anna Gunn

Best scene: It is tough to choose between three key moments: 1. Hank's death, 2. The Jane reveal, and 3. The final crumbling of the White family. I decided that the third one had the most impact largely because it was the end of Walter as a person. His family is so scared of him that they brandished and used a kitchen knife in defense. He has nothing to live for and there's little hope that Jesse will be seen with a positive light in his eyes for the final two episodes. However, with Walt Jr. finally becoming the hero of the story and the truth of Hank's death becoming prevalent to everyone, the episode couldn't get any darker. That is, until Walter gets so mad that he steals Holly and leaves, crushing Skyler's parked car in the process. If anything, this scene has the strongest impact because Walter is so scary now that even the word "bitch," which had been inoffensively used by Jesse before, is used as a threat here. 

Bryan Cranston

Predictions: Now that I got my wish of Jane getting her due, I can wonder how exactly you top easily the best episode of Breaking Bad. It was a bleak, cathartic episode in which the cast and crew proved that they were playing hardball. With two episodes left, it is hard to gauge anything happening for more than a brief period of time. Still, in "Granite State," I predict a road trip to New Hampshire. This is the second reference to the state (the first being the episode "Live Free or Die") and it would be dumb for them to not honor it. My one belief in that the final line claiming that there's unfinished business will be that it involves Gray Matter, the company that he famously was bought out for with thousands and went on to earn billions. He is a greedy man who has lost all but $11 million. There has to be something there that is drawing him in. I am thinking that if he doesn't rob them, he is at least going to do something unpleasant to Gretchen and Elliott Schwartz. I also don't see Jesse getting much better other than that we'll probably get to see the most sadistic side of Todd in the show's history. I would love for Walter and Jesse to be reunited on good terms, but in reality, I think Jesse will survive the next episode, but not the finale.